As I mentioned in my last post, we found out that I was pregnant after the first round of IVF on April 16, 2018.
About a week and a half later (not exactly sure on the date), I went to work wearing a long black shirt and khaki pants. I sat at my computer and felt a weird cramp but didn’t think anything of it. When I stood up to greet my students, I could tell something was going on. Luckily, there was an assistant teacher in my room to watch my class so I could run to the bathroom. There was a lot of blood when I got in there – I tried hard to remain calm, as I realized it was on my pants. Thankfully, I had that long shirt on so I could hide it. I ran to one of my great friends at work and immediately started sobbing. I was sure I had lost the baby. I got the ounce of signal I could find in my school building and called my husband and then my doctor’s office. My husband came to get me at work and brought me a change of clothes and we rushed up to the doctor’s office. We got into the room and the ultrasound showed our baby! We could even see the flickering heartbeat!
I found out that I had a subchorionic bleed from the placenta not attaching quite right. The doctors assured me that plenty of women had them, and it only increased my risk of miscarriage slightly. I had to have weekly internal ultrasounds until I was 10 weeks pregnant with my fertility doctor. Then at 10 weeks, they told me that they were no longer worried about miscarriage, and I “graduated” from the fertility specialist!
I did have to visit a high-risk specialist doctor, as they wanted to keep an eye on the bleeding. I also (obviously) had my regular visits with my OB every four weeks. I am going to be honest, during this time I did not enjoy being pregnant. I was so lucky not to be sick, however I had a lot of other unpleasant symptoms that I did not enjoy. Plus I was so paranoid about the bleeding.
At almost 20 weeks, I went back to the high risk doctor. We were so excited because it was my birthday, and we were going to find out the gender! I was really, really hoping for a girl because my cousin had a girl a few months before that. We were already scheming that we were going to make them be best friends like we are. We got two pieces of amazing news at that appointment – it was a girl! – and my subchorionic bleed was gone! 🙂 My husband and I left that appointment ecstatic! I was no longer high risk, and everything looked great!
A few days later, I left with my friend from college to drive to Florida to visit my aunt and uncle. We had a really amazing time, and it was a really perfect and awesome vacation. However, the night before we left, I started getting super uncomfortable. (TMI warning!) I honestly thought it was because I was so constipated (as I was basically my entire pregnancy). I tried to go to the bathroom with no luck. I then got in bed and started crying because I had this awful feeling that something was wrong. I was freaking out because I was so far away from home, so I called the on-call doctor at my practice to see if they thought I should go to the ER. I talked to my now favorite doctor (who delivered Scarlett later) at the practice; he was so calming and reassuring. He said that everything I was describing sounded exactly like round ligament pain. (A pretty normal thing that happens when you are growing in the second trimester). I will ALWAYS second guess not going to the ER that night – even though I love and trust the doctor I talked to that night. (Oh, and literally every single symptom matched the description of round ligament pain that night)
When I got home from my trip, I ordered a pregnancy pillow to help with the discomfort. This helped a lot! I felt so much better and assumed that everything was really round ligament pain.
On August 17, 2018, Bobby and I met up with a group of his coworkers at a Billy Currington concert. I wore my cowgirl boots even though we were standing at the whole concert. I had been feeling great, so I decided to go for it! I ended up making Bobby leave before the concert was over because my feet were soooo swollen! Then the next day, I woke up and was so uncomfortable and in a lot of pain. I called the on-call doctor (as it was a Saturday) and we both agreed that it was probably because I stood for so long and pushed it a little too far the night before. I took it really easy on Saturday, and then we had my family over for dinner that night. I remember that I had SUCH a hard time getting comfortable that night when we were playing board games. No matter where I sat, I was miserable. I also had a lot of discharge that night. (sorry again for the TMI!) Sunday, I literally didn’t move from the couch all day. I was so uncomfortable again. I knew that if I still felt bad on Monday, I would call the doctor again. Then all night Sunday night I basically didn’t sleep. I was in so much pain and I had a lot of heavy discharge.
Monday morning, I called the doctor again and talked to the nurse. She told me to flush my body with as much water as possible, and call back in a few hours if I didn’t feel better. (They were thinking UTI, possibly turning into a kidney infection because I had a lot of back pain). Maybe an hour later, I went to the bathroom and saw blood. I called my mom (Bobby was at work) and told her I thought I needed to go to the hospital. I was literally going to drive myself! My mom drove me there and I just sat in silence the whole way. I thought I was just waiting to get to labor and delivery and find out they couldn’t find the heartbeat. However, right away, they found her heartbeat. I texted Bobby and he was so relieved! A few minutes later, the doctor on call came in to do a pelvic exam because they weren’t sure what was causing the issue.
I vividly remember her gently putting her hands on my legs and telling me, “you are fully dilated and will probably have to deliver today, I’m so sorry but your daughter probably won’t make it.”
I didn’t immediately lose hope. I had a feeling deep down all along that I was in labor. (Turns out I had a lot of back labor, which is why I had so much back pain). I called Bobby at work and he left and drove to the hospital as fast as he could. They told me that they were going to put me in the hospital bed with my head down and my feet in the air (laying at a diagonal). This was to “let gravity do it’s thing.” I also immediately had to be pumped full of antibiotics because I was susceptible to infection because my membranes had ruptured. We also found out that all the discharge I had was a very slow, slow leak of amniotic fluid (essentially my water broke, just really slowly).
The rest of the day Monday, and all day Tuesday was pretty much the same. I was stuck in the hospital bed at an angle, on a clear liquid diet (in case they had to do a D&C after delivery), and we prayed and prayed that Scarlett would stay put until 24 weeks (considered viable life). I was 22 weeks, 5 days on Tuesday.
By Tuesday night, my contractions got bad. The pain medicine was no longer helping. Around 6pm, I told Bobby that she was coming that night; I could just tell. At 10pm, I could feel her moving into the birth canal and they ordered me an epidural.
Scarlett Lynn was born at 11:58pm on August 21. She was 15.5 ounces and 11 inches long.
That night was absolutely surreal. I was in total shock and I didn’t even cry. I just remember thinking she was so completely perfect. (Aside from the fact that she was basically Bobby’s twin!) The days following were really, really, REALLY awful though. Once it set in what had happened, I was so angry.
I was mostly angry because Scarlett was alive and healthy throughout the whole thing (literally until I started pushing I could feel her moving); she was just too small to survive delivery. I was so angry at my body, because it was my body’s fault that this whole thing happened. I knew that there was nothing I had done wrong, but it didn’t stop me from being angry.
Honestly, as I write this post, I am still so angry. Right now, I am supposed to have a baby (my due date was December 20th). I have moved past this situation and am definitely 1000% stronger and better than I was a few months ago, but I’m still mad it happened.
Sometimes we never know why things happen, and I guess there is no way of knowing. All we can do now is continue to hope and pray that Scarlett picks us an amazing little brother or sister for her (and soon!).
Thanks for sticking out for the long post – I promise I’ll try to be cheerier in my next one! xoxo